We have seen in previous posts that design and verification problems fall in the class of computationally complex hard problems. That is, in the worst case, it takes O(2^N) time to optimize/verify a design of size N, where N could represent the number of binary inputs. If we run into this limit, our ability to design large systems is severely limited.

Given these limits, then, how it is possible that we can routinely create designs consisting of millions of lines of code or gates? More importantly, how we can continue to design increasingly larger, more complex designs?

One answer is that we can’t. We can’t find all the bugs in complex designs, but we can hope that there are no critical bugs. We can’t perfectly optimize a design, but we can do a good enough job. Even then, exponential complexity should be a brick wall to increasing complexity, but is not. Somehow, we are able to avoid these limits.

One way to look at this is to consider the way human brains are built and work in creating complex designs. The jumping off point for understanding this is Shannon’s counting argument.

Claude Shannon was one of the most important computer scientists of the twentieth century. He is most famous for his work on information theory. Shannon’s counting argument is one of his less well known results. Shannon was trying to answer the question, what is the minimum number of gates (say two-input NAND gates) needed to be able to implement any function of N binary inputs? The basic answer is that there must exist functions that require an exponential number of gates to implement. The proof goes by counting the number of possible functions of N inputs and counting the number of functions implementable with T gates and showing that T is o(2^N). The argument is as follows:

the number of functions of N inputs is 2^(2^N). For example, a truth table for N=4 would have 16 entries. The number of functions, therefore is 2^16=16,384.

The number of functions of N inputs that can be implemented with T 2-input gates is (N+T)^(2T). Each gate input can connect to the output of any other gate or an input for a total of (N+T) possible connections and there are 2T gate inputs.

Solving for T shows that T >= 2^(N-d) for some small delta d, which implies that T = o(2^N).

What is the significance of this? Today’s chips have as many as 1000 pins. What is the minimum number of gates required on the chip that would allow us to implement any function of a thousand inputs? Is, say, one million gates sufficient? Off the top of your head, you probably would say no. What about a billion? Our preconceived notion is that this should be sufficient. After all, that is right at the limit of today’s most advanced chips and it is inconceivable that we couldn’t implement what we want with that many gates.

Now lets look at what the counting argument has to say about this. The total number of possible functions is 2^(2^1000), which is a vast number, roughly 10^(10^300). A billion 2-input NAND gates would allow us to implement roughly 10^(10^10) different functions with a thousand inputs. This is also a vast number, but is infinitesimal compared to the number of possible functions. The fact is, we are limited to a very small number of functions that can be implemented!

And this picture doesn’t fundamentally change even if we assume we have a trillion gates at our disposal. So, how is it we believe that we can implement whatever functionality we need? To answer this, let’s work backward from the number of gates available and determine the maximum number of inputs for which we can implement any arbitrary function. Let’s choose the most complex system we have at our disposal, the human brain.

The human brain contains on the order of a trillion neurons, each with roughly a thousand connections. Assuming all neurons can be connected to any other neuron (which is not the case), we come up with an upper bound on the number of functions that can be implemented: (10^10)^(1000 * 10^10) = 10^(10^14) = 2^(2^40). In the best case, therefore, the human brain could implement any function of just 40 binary inputs.

Now we can do a thought experiment. What is the largest size truth table that you can mentally make sense of at one time? Two bits is easy. Three bits not so hard. Four bits is difficult to visualize as a truth table, but using visual aids such as Karnaugh maps makes it possible.

Another test would be to look at the placement of arbitrarily placed objects on a plane. Given a glance, how accurately could you replicate the placement of all objects. If there were only one object, I could envision determining placement with an accuracy of 5-6 bits in both X and Y dimensions. More objects with less accuracy. Beyond about seven objects , it is is difficult to even remember exactly how many objects there are. Maybe 10-12 bits accuracy overall is possible.

The bottom line is the human brain has a very low capacity for consciously grasping an arbitrary function. Let’s say its no more that 10 bits in the best case. From the counting argument, we can determine that it requires slightly more than 500 gates to implement any arbitrary function of 10 inputs. With a million gates on a chip, we could put 20000 such functions on the chip.

Now we treat each of these 500 gate blocks as a unit and then consider how to hook these 20000 blocks together to perform some function. This is certainly possible using abstraction. In this case it would probably require two or more levels of abstraction to be able to deal with 20000 blocks.

Abstraction is the essence by which we are able to design very large systems. The need for abstraction is driven by the limitations on our brain in dealing with large functions imposed by Shannon’s counting argument. And it is the structure imposed by multiple layers of abstraction that makes intractable design and verification problems become tractable.